President Obama’s climate speech: 10 takeaways

President Barack Obama outlined a wide-ranging climate plan Tuesday that’s centered on greenhouse gas regulations for power plants — while making a surprise mention of the Keystone XL oil pipeline and defending his increasingly embattled nominee for EPA administrator.

“The question now is whether we will have the courage to act before it is too late,” Obama said in a lengthy speech at Georgetown University that formally introduced his second-term climate agenda. “And how we answer will have a profound impact on the world we leave behind not just to you but to your children and your grandchildren. As a president, as a father and as an American, I am here to say we need to act.”

Obama's climate change speech- Jim VandeHei reports

Obama urges action on climate

Despite expectations that the president would steer clear of mentioning Keystone — and the fact that the White House plan never mentions the project — Obama announced that he would support building the pipeline only if it won’t “significantly” increase greenhouse gas emissions.

Obama didn’t say if he thinks Keystone can meet that standard, although a draft State Department study issued in March called the project’s environmental impact negligible.

“Our national interest will be served only if this project does not significantly exacerbate the problem of carbon pollution,” Obama said. “The net effects of the pipeline’s impact on our climate will be absolutely critical to determining whether this project is allowed to go forward.”

In its draft study in March, the State Department downplayed worries that Keystone would inspire a huge, carbon-spewing increase in oil production from Canada’s tar sands region — arguing that Canadians will tap that supply “with or without the proposed project,” and that the crude could be exported by rail. Greens disagree, saying the pipeline is critical to whether Canada has any incentive to ramp up production.

Both supporters and opponents of the pipeline issued statements during the speech calling Obama’s words favorable for their side.

Obama reserved special praise for Gina McCarthy, his nominee to head the Environmental Protection Agency. McCarthy’s nomination was already being held up by Senate Republicans’ complaints that the agency is secretive, and Obama’s climate push has prompted some top GOP lawmakers to warn that she faces even more trouble.

“The Senate should confirm her without any further obstruction or delay,” Obama said, noting that McCarthy, who currently heads the EPA’s air office, has worked for past Republican governors.

And he took a few shots at Republicans who question climate science.

“We don’t have time for a meeting of the Flat Earth Society,” Obama said. “Sticking your head in the sand might make you feel safer, but it’s not going to protect you from the coming storm.”

Obama tried to get a cap-and-trade bill through Congress during his first term, and in this year’s State of the Union address he gave lawmakers one final ultimatum.

“If Congress won’t act soon to protect future generations, I will,” he said in the February speech. “I will direct my Cabinet to come up with executive actions we can take, now and in the future, to reduce pollution, prepare our communities for the consequences of climate change and speed the transition to more sustainable sources of energy.”

But even at the time, the universal expectation was that Congress had zero chance of passing any serious climate legislation. His rollout Tuesday acknowledged that reality.

Now, the president is directing agencies from the Department of Agriculture to the EPA to take action — with the main onus falling on the EPA.

The days when it seemed possible to impose an economywide cap on greenhouse gas emissions are long gone. Instead, the president is taking a piecemeal approach that focuses on one sector of the economy at a time.

In his first term, he tackled transportation, which accounts for about 30 percent of the country’s greenhouse gas output, by imposing tough standards to reduce vehicles’ emissions and increase fuel economy.